


Good Mourning

by sgtfarron



Series: Nights [5]
Category: Person of Interest (TV)
Genre: Angst, F/F, introspective, neurodivergent
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-05
Updated: 2016-03-05
Packaged: 2018-05-24 19:32:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 666
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6164117
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sgtfarron/pseuds/sgtfarron
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It’s a disruption of the norm but you’re not wired to grieve and you adapt almost instantly (even if you didn’t really want to this time).</p>
            </blockquote>





	Good Mourning

**Author's Note:**

> I've been listening to Sleeping at last's Saturn and Neptune all afternoon and it got me thinking about loss.
> 
> Sgt-farron.tumblr.com

You don’t think you’ve ever felt guilty before, not really. It never really worked on you; nothing ever evoked a negative feeling in you in such a way as to motivate you to not act how you wanted to in cases where you really  _ wanted _ to. Instead, you chose to deviate because it was your job, an order or because it was just less of a headache. 

Never was it something you felt after the fact. No emotions ever tugged at you once you’ve already acted, even in instances where you could agree that it would have probably been easier on the whole had you not. 

You thought that, maybe, with how everything had been going with Root that it might somehow be different. That if something were to happen you may have reacted differently, more appropriately. Closer to how you were supposed to (like a  _ real _ person). 

It was a weird hope. 

You should have known. Over three decades of life experience doesn’t just change on a dime because something happens to the person that managed to set their life in orbit around yours. It’s a disruption of the norm but you’re not wired to grieve and you adapt almost instantly (even if you didn’t really want to this time).

Though you are starting to wonder when the numbness in your limbs will start to subside because it’s making aiming your gun take more effort than it ought to and you’ve hit fewer kneecaps and more femoral arteries than you should.

This might be what guilt feels like to you though, you think, staring down at your hands as you turn them over pressing your fingertips together, testing the feeling. 

She was supposed to be able to take care of herself, always did before you came along. Since you made her forget her own self you decided you’d pick up the slack. And you failed. Because, as you all came to realize, despite appearances Root never learned – too willing to this day to stray, headlong, no armor into the fray for you all. 

Guilt.

And maybe this is grief for you. The feeling of your heart pumping too hard for a few beats, a moment almost like choking and the greedy gulp of air you suck into your lungs when you think on her too long anymore. These few moments out of the norm have been haunting you for weeks since you first got the news. 

And if that’s the case you want it to stop. Soon. Now.

Because she is here, and alive, and  _ not _ dead and you _know that now_. She looks like she could be, pale as a damn ghost. But she’s healing at a healthy pace for her injuries and there is nothing to grieve. 

So you keep doing your job, hoping that it comes to an end. Because you’re not wired for this and feeling like you're choking on your heart is a really uncomfortable feeling, and you swear to god if your legs continue to decide to act like you just ran 10 km every time you see her in that damn bed you’ll likely shoot someone because you never signed up for this.

Everything you know about grief involves stages and volatile emotions, things you don’t have, so you don’t know how you’ll ever get over it and if this is guilt? You’re glad you’ve never had this; even as dimmed down as it is for you, you don’t like it, this itch like you are not fully settled with what happened (as you normally would be). Having a nagging wish that things had gone differently. 

And your heart’s doing that damn choking thing again.

So you decide sleep would be a good course of action, putting away your guns, leaving the subway and heading for your apartment. Your last thoughts before you sleep are of her and hoping she’ll wake up soon so maybe when she starts talking things will finally slot back into place for you. 

**Author's Note:**

> So no death but did I make you feel things? I was trying to make myself feel things and ended with mixed results because I've experienced loss to have a minor, minor effect on me, but never a lover and well I was trying to imagine and write Shaw accordingly.


End file.
